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Tips For Improving What You Already Have

As entrepreneurs, we often rush to get a project out and to market. Even though some parts of the process may not be complete but because they are not critical to the brand nor for sales, we launch the product with the intention of coming back later to complete or improve it. The problem is, later almost always never comes around and before you know it, we’re off to a new project or some other priority comes up.

However, growing a business doesn’t always mean creating new things. It also means making what you have better. The thought of going back and looking at everything you have seems like a rather daunting task and it can be. To get you started, the following are some pointers to get you going.

Promoting Yourself More

This is more of a problem for websites than actual storefronts if you have one. Take a good look. Do you have banners or clips that lead people to areas of your e-store or deeper into your content? If not, add them. They can be traditional banner ads that promote your own inventory or special offers. Or, they can be blurbs. In short, keep people clicking around your site for as long as possible.

If you’re on social media, take some time to review your own stream as well. What have you posted in the last 7, 14 or 30 days? It’s OK to not be self promoting on every tweet or post because social media doesn’t work that way BUT, if all you are posting is other people’s blog posts, funny stuff, personal references and so on, that’s not going to work either.

Go through old posts on your blog and pick out those that have done especially well and re-post them to your social networks. Make sure you update your post to have a call to action to join your list or buy your products too.

Implement split testing

When sending out email campaigns or advertising online, it is very easy these days to test out two or more versions of your ads and emails. Doing this will quickly tell you which headline or ad copy gets more attention, more traffic or more sales. You’ll also stop wasting money on ineffective advertising too.

Update literature and autoresponders

Things change over time and you may have new hours, new products, discontinued ones or simply information that is not relevant anymore in your communication. Update them and while you’re doing that, ask yourself if the designs can be updated to look more current, to reflect your brand today. Do you need to do it?

Make your sales process smoother

If you have a service business, is the process for taking a lead to a customer and completing the project fluid? Do you have all the contracts ready and/or do they need updating? If you sell online, is your ordering and delivery process confusing? Do customers tend to get stuck in one area regularly? How can the process be smoother and easier for your customers so they have the best experience as possible?

Qualifying your leads

Building a list can be an expensive, resource intensive process. You want to make sure you don’t just end up with a list of names, but one that is ultimately responsive. One way to guarantee that is to build a more qualified list. There are many ways to qualify people before they get signed up. Through the proper advertising copy, even your offers. If you use WordPress to manage your website, consider a plugin like Survey Funnel. It leads prospects through a series of easy questions and subscribes them to different lists based on their input. This way, you can always craft your message so they are highly relevant to the reader.

I started my first offline business around 1992 I owned and operated a radio sales and repair shop for about 4 yrs. I have beenonline since around 1996. I dabbled mostly and it wasn`t till 2006 when I went to my first Big Seminarthat I really saw what the internet was doing right at my fingertips.Since then I have started and currently run several service sites online.My personal brand online is notcompleted yet but I work on it daily in the hopes of establishing myself.

I decided to narrow down those that I truly follow and recommend. Armand Morin , Michel and Sylvie Fortin and Jim Howard author of Branded for Success are my main sources of knowledge these days by choice.For inspirationTony Robbins fills the bill nicely. I have to say that Ed Dale is still a favorite and I love what he has done with the Challenge and the amount of people I know who have benefited .Jimmy D Brown,Jim Edwards are always trusted sources of quality information.

I intentionally cut back on those that I follow to reduce the noise and allow me to focus on what is important.This is not to say there are not plenty of good people to learn from. I just think you need to choose a few and immerse yourself in what they can offer.

Napoleon Hill- is a must read for anyone in business

I think I have a diverse enough background to bring some good things to smallbusinessbranding.com . I look forward to the chance to prove it.

Comments

Great post Ken. I have trouble keeping the funnel relevant. As you’re aware I’m currently promoting my new book, and I have a pretty extensive promotional plan. The endgame is to build my list and monetize with consulting products. It’s a long-term strategy, but one that I feel has larger opportunities. Thanks for the heads up here.

I think to few in business truly have a long range strategy in place.I commend you for having one Ed We all set goals and go to work but so many times where we were going is not where we end up.Things move and change so fast in today`s world that we are often forced to change our strategy on the fly. The important thing is forward momentum and getting accomplished the important aspects of our business.

[email protected] Roach I think to few in business truly have a long range strategy in place.I commend you for having one Ed We all set goals and go to work but so many times where we were going is not where we end up.Things move and change so fast in today`s world that we are often forced to change our strategy on the fly. The important thing is forward momentum and getting accomplished the important aspects of our business.

Indeed Great Post! Thanks for sharing this valuable information. It is very important to use the right method of doing promotion of our business in the right manner. Therefore, every business wants that his business grows and he makes his clients happy with his services.

Thanks for the post Ken. Improving a product or a service is one of the business strategies businessmen always seemed to forgot. I mean why not give it a try to improve those old ones and we’ll never know it might work out this time around.

Prospects should be able to be familiar with company as well as the products. If you intend to get started on outsourcing services, you better start as early as possible that you should take pleasure in the benefits.

Thanks for sharing the nice information Ken. Its really a great post for a person who want to improve himself. I believe in the thing that a person always remain in the state of learning till death. So we should look into ourselves and the world outside us and should always try to gain knowledge and observing and experiencing new things.

That is interesting, Do you think Facebook is using Instagram pages to monetize and make some money out of it. I know with sites like Pinterest Image have become very popular on the web. I think there is a good chance that you can set up store and sell photos as well. Photographer are going to love thishttp://adoresoftphone.com/softphones/softphone-premium.html

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